THE NEW YOR.KER. dio as he runs toward the store. , M OMENTS later, Paula comes through the door of Reah's house with de- tails. Deputy Sheriff Snooky Peterson is on his way from Chamber- ton to the intersection of Routes 630 and 611. Marsha's car has to go past there to get on a main road. They're not bringing the dogs yet; they don't think they'll need them. But extra cruisers are coming from Stilson. Paula is gone, quick- ly as she arrived, back to her radio. So Reah is alone when she sees a brown shirt moving past her side window. There's enough time to imagine general escape, her house in siege to criminals, before the figure emerges in her front yard. It's Barry, walking across the lawn, up the road and past the guard, into the ditch He's worked up a sweat by the time his supervisor returns from the corner. When men and trucks are gone for the day, people begin to come out to the road to inspect the ditch dug by convicts. That evening, taking her stroll with Jonah, Reah says, "What he must have done is come around behind the store when he finished his little visit with Marsha, and then walked along in back of the houses until he came across our yard. Right here's where the man with the rifle was standing. Mrs. Presnell says the supervisor told her all Barry said afterward was he had to 'go to the bushes. ' Was the ditch ever this deep before! " "Doesn't matter much, " Jonah says. "The water just sits there anyway." He says he can't see why Marsha would have peeled out in such a hurry. "Paula thinks it was diversionary tactics," Reah says, "but Donna Kearns told her that Marsha was just angry Barry hadn't written her and said he wasn't going to." ,.i" / ,'" "'- ""...... "' '- ", t ' 45 E!&o.o . . ' '" '* i " r .I'" ,."""< 'x . í""' "" - . \. /\ .... ... '\ \ , "'E . ..",'. -- """", o 1. <o!t'" ' .: '-'-. 2- "'. ,'>. r"::"" . '"" .n ,,'" i ((. . . and that's the way I see it. Ilnd now back to you, Ralph." B ARRY'S home again, free. Some people think he and Marsha have broken up. For the. few days remaining . before classes started, they wanted to go to the beach and take Marsha's car, which is actually in her father's name, but he said they couldn't use it. Barry defied him over the phone, but in the end they obeyed Marsha's parents and stayed home. "The only reason you don't see them," Paula says, "is be- cause it's raining again and they're somew here indoors." When they show up at the Kearnses' Labor Day picnic Reah claps her hands to see them mingling arms and glances. She feels so 'grateful to Barry for not trying to escape and, for some reason, for working so hard on the road gang. Even when he and Marsha try to ride double on the Kearnses' moped and leave a deep rut in the soggy lawn, she's warmed by their sporting. Reah moves across the lawn looking for something alcoholic to drink, without ice She doesn't really trust Kool-Aid made with water from the Kearnses' tap. "Water, water everywhere . . ." It's Paula again, wanting to know why it always has to rain so hard just before a party. Jonah has found one of the last cold cans of beer. "We're not the only ones with the problem," he says. And he tells Paula his story about the sisters at Our Lady of the Hills Academy, not . five miles north, who tried to dig a well last summer. First they hired a water witch, and then hung a rosary on the drilling rig. Went down seven hundred feet and got a dry hole. "To- day their ground's just like this," he says, stomping his heel, splattering muddy water on his own pants. "Look ""That you've done," Reah says, surprised at the pleasure Jonah takes in demonstrating that Worton doesn't percolate. At the other end of the yard, Barry and Marsha and Donna Kearns are in a three-way splashing war. Barry is the star, tak- ing long slides in the grass, sending spray to waist level. "We always believed he was the one who ruined Toby's bicycle," Paula. says. "Of course, that's past history." Reah is looking beyond her, down the road, along the swollen ditch, the whole length of Worton, gladdened by the slight stir of news and water. - JOHN ROLFE GARDINER . Such a willingness involves being recep- tive to work not always associated with the standard repertoire. "I see as one of my goals the a bili ty to bring indifferent music, not only for the audience, but the orchestra as well," he said. "It makes the musicians better, and it improves the ear of the audience" -Ari- zona Republtc. Tin?